Highway Layouts

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I reassure my noble friend that we certainly consider nature corridors along new highways—not for all of them, because obviously not all are suitable for that sort of thing. Highways England has a huge commitment to biodiversity. For example, my noble friend will be pleased to know that we will improve the habitat alongside the M6 corridor from Preston to the border with Scotland.

[Lord Bradshaw (LD) [V]]

My Lords, in making the business case for the proposed roadworks close to Wisley Gardens, it is likely that the time-savings for road users will be taken into account? What proportion of the expected time-savings is of two minutes duration or less? Also, has account been taken in such calculations of the likely fall in commuter traffic and flows to and from Gatwick and Heathrow?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

As I have stated previously, I cannot go into detail about the scheme the noble Lord mentioned, but I can say that the junction around the M25 is one of the most highly congested junctions on our motorway network, and it sees 270,000 vehicles a day. Therefore, even two minutes per vehicle would be a significant time saving, both from an economic and social perspective, and it would also have environmental benefits.

The scheme is also designed to improve safety. That particular junction has the highest casualty rate on the M25. It is too early to understand what the long-term impacts of Covid are, but traffic levels have rebounded very strongly. However, each scheme already has a low-growth scenario, which is taken into account in granting planning.